Optical tweezers use optical gradient forces to trap small, usually micrometer-scale, volumes of matter in both two and three dimensions. A holographic form of optical tweezer can use a computer-generated diffractive optical element to create large numbers of optical tweezers from a single laser beam. These tweezers can be arranged in any desired configuration dependent on the need at hand.
Although systems are known to move particles precisely and with a relatively high degree of confidence, conventional systems require a separate hologram to be projected for each discrete step of a particle's motion. Computing multiple holograms can be time consuming and requires substantial computational effort. Furthermore, computer-addressable projection systems required to implement such computer-generated optical tweezers or other dynamic optical tweezer systems, such as scanned optical tweezers, tend to be prohibitively expensive.